Apple on Tuesday lifted the lid on its latest creation, the fifth-generation tablet, the iPad Air.

Chief executive Tim Cook took to the stage at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco, California, along with other senior executives and vice presidents, to announce the fifth major refresh of its popular tablet since it first launched in 2010.

New design; thinner and lighter: The 9.7-inch Retina display comes with a resolution of 2,048 x 1,536 pixels. It also lands with a narrower side bezel. At just 7.3 millmeters thin, it's about 43 percent thinner than the fourth-generation iPad. The tablet is also lighter, at just 1 pound in weight, or 28 percent lighter than its predecessor.

64-bit A7 chip: Following on from the iPhone 5s, the world's first 64-bit mobile phone, the iPad Air will now land with the next-generation processor. With over 1 billion transistors, it has 56-times the processing power in the new processor, according to Apple, which can make some apps run as much as five-times faster. The chip also comes with an M6 motion coprocessor.

Image: Apple

Faster Wi-Fi: Now up to twice-as-fast networking, Wi-Fi will run up to 300Mbps. The device also supports MIMO, and uses two antennas to deliver faster and more reliable speeds. iPad Air also supports Bluetooth 4.0.

Expanded LTE support: iPad Air is now supported in additional countries and regions with the addition of more LTE band support.

Improved battery: Despite its thinner and lighter design, the iPad Air will still land with 10-hour battery life on a single charge.